Fair Weather Zen
by Elizabeth Goode
Summary: Oneshot fic. Charlie wakes up in the night and needs a friend.


**Fair Weather Zen**

**by Elizabeth Goode**

Charlie sat up quickly, a gasp catching in his throat. The dream again. He shivered, willing the images that flashed through his mind like a slideshow of horrors to subside. Sitting up straight, he assumed the posture that he found most calming for his meditations. Seven minutes later, he let out a frustrated sigh. It wasn't working. Wryly, he thought to himself that he was experiencing a Zen malfunction. How could something so abstract, something that had helped him survive the hell of prison, fail him when he was doing battle with dreams, ghosts, and memories instead of dire physical and emotional distress?

During the day, his mind was occupied with police work – the cases he and Dani were assigned. He worried about mundane things like understanding technology he had missed out on during his twelve years in Pelican Bay. He considered fruit, clothing, women, movies, music, and cars – things he hadn't been able to think about in prison without risking creating a chink in the Zen armor he had constructed to protect himself from a hostile environment. He squinted in the darkness, feeling around for his cell phone to find out what time it was. Three-thirty. Fantastic. It was three-thirty in the morning and there was no way he was going to be able to go back to sleep.

Alone in his room, the enormity of his freedom began to close in on him. The idea of all of the empty rooms and space in his house overwhelmed him, and before he could manage any rational thought, he was in a corner of his room, back against the wall, hugging his knees. The case with the fallen angel had really gotten to him. Finding that room full of cages and finding a human being caged like the dogs had brought to the surface thoughts and memories that Charlie had tried to keep buried in the back of his mind. He remembered the suffocating loneliness of his cell – missing his wife and parents and friends. He remembered the terrible pain from the violent beatings he had suffered at the hands of other prisoners and guards alike. He remembered the day he realized his wife would not be coming to see him – ever. He remembered signing his divorce papers shakily with his arm broken and in a cast. He remembered sitting alone in his cell for hours and hours with nothing to do but meditate. He remembered the soul-crushing devastation when he finally realized that everyone, even those who were supposed to love him and support him, thought that he had killed that family. No one believed him, and so there was no one he could talk to about his grief. Unconsciously, he began to rock himself, curled into the corner of his room.

At four o'clock, Ted got up to use the restroom, staggering out into the dark hallway, half awake and half angry that biology had forced him to wakefulness before it was even properly morning. Passing by the partially open door to Charlie's room, he hesitated for a moment. He could hear movement, a slight creaking of the hardwood floor. Not wanting to invade his benefactor and friend's privacy, he started to continue his path to the bathroom, but stopped when he heard a muffled sound.

"Oh, God. Why? Why don't you believe me? I didn't do it. I didn't do it ..."

"Charlie?" Ted pushed the door open slightly.

"I didn't do it!"

An all-to-familiar sight greeted Ted's eyes – Charlie was backed into a corner, knees drawn up to his chin, rocking back and forth. Every now and then a rock was punctuated by a soft, desperate, "I didn't do it."

When Ted had been assigned as Charlie's cellmate, he had been grateful that he hadn't been placed with some murderous thug. Instead of a psychopath, Ted had ended up bunking with Charlie, the Zen master of meditation. While other guys in prison were defending their honor against those who would make them their bitches or steal their few possessions, Ted had ended up with kind, peaceful Charlie, who was regularly beaten so badly that Ted had to help him to the toilet more than once. Charlie had taught Ted to survive in prison, and Ted had in turn done his best to help his cellmate.

Kneeling in front of the distressed man, Ted touched his arm gently. "Charlie, snap out of it."

Startled eyes opened wide, shadowed with embarrassment at being caught.

Uncomfortably, Charlie scooted away, nervously avoiding eye contact. "Did I ... wake you? I'm sorry."

"You didn't wake me up – I was headed to the bathroom. Listen, Charlie. I'm not good at this stuff, you know that, but if you need to talk, man – you wake me up. Got it?"

Charlie still looked slightly uncomfortable, but he looked up, real gratitude evident on his face. "I thought this crap would stop now that I'm out."

Ted nodded understandingly. "The dreams or the anxiety?"

"Both. I meant to tell you earlier ... thanks for understanding about the fence. It just kind of got to me."

"Charlie, believe me when I say that if I had known, I never would have ordered that fencing. I just didn't think."

"It's okay. I told you not to worry about it anymore. I just – I dreamed about prison and when I tried to meditate to calm down and clear my mind, it – it didn't work. I couldn't get into it. I kind of feel betrayed by the Zen, I guess." A slight smile haunted the corners of his mouth, and Ted let out an audible sigh of relief. "That case you and Dani just finished – the one with the mad Russian and his cages – it got to you, didn't it?"

Charlie nodded. "A little too close to home, I guess. I'm not sure I'm ever going to be okay with confinement. Constance hates it that I don't lock the doors. She thinks I'm going to be killed by someone who thinks I did it."

"She might be right." Ted looked pointedly at his landlord and friend.

Changing the subject, Charlie stood and stretched. "I think I'm up for the day, due to a nagging case of fairweather Zen. I bought pomegranates at the organic farmer's market. Wanna split one?"

Giving Charlie a critical glance, Ted was momentarily overcome with gratitude. Here was a young man who had suffered greatly and had still found the strength to survive and help others. Charlie hadn't deserved prison, but had done his best to keep Ted, who had deserved to be there, from getting into too much trouble. His friends and family may have deserted him, and his ability to achieve Zen meditation may be temporarily offline, but one thing Charlie did have going for him was Ted's loyalty.

"You go ahead and start peeling it, and I'll join you in a few. Pomegranates are good, but they're a bitch to eat. All those little seeds."

"Takes a bitch to know a bitch, Ted."

From the smile on Charlie's face, Ted was convinced that his friend was feeling better. "I'm going to avoid the obvious retorts involving prison and bitches. Go cut some fruit at 4AM. Hell, we might as well have a beer."

As Ted shut the bathroom door, Charlie made his way down to the kitchen, pulled out two beers and a pomegranate, and commenced peeling. The knowledge that he wasn't alone wasn't an instant cure-all, but it helped. It really, really helped.

-- End


End file.
